Officials at the Dutch multinational boast that they are the first to bring adaptive intelligence to radiology.
Chris Newmarker
Philips's new llumeo imaging and informatics technology uses adaptive intelligence to make it easier for radiologists to work with medical images.
Philips announced Illumeo's introduction on Sunday. It integrates with existing systems including Philips IntelliSpace PACS.
The intelligent software is but the latest example of "smart" imaging technology that has the potential to be a disruptive force in the space.
Other major players include IBM, which spent $1 billion last year to acquire Chicago-based Merge Healthcare and its medical imaging management platform. The resulting Watson Health medical imaging collaborative aims to use IBM's supercomputer to discover previously "invisible" unstructured imaging data.
The need for improvement is real: Radiology, pathology, and the clinical laboratory each have error rates between 2% and 5%, according to a 2012 study published in JAMA.
"Radiologists are central in the diagnosis process, with a critical role in definitive diagnostics and improvement of patient care. By supporting clinicians with adaptive intelligence and providing health IT solutions to foster collaboration between multidisciplinary care teams, we aim to extend the power of their clinical expertise," Jeroen Tas, CEO of Connected Care and Health Informatics at Philips, said in a news release.
Philips says Illumeo offers a number of advantages:
There is contextual relevance for the radiologist because the software provides meaningful patient information through a "patient briefing." Illumeo is also anatomy-aware, suggesting tools based on what the user is examining;
Adaptive intelligence records and reproduces the user's hanging protocols in order to create a tailored experience and workflow.
Illumeo has guidelines built into the system to remind radiologists of best practices. The goal is to create more standardized care;
The software also uses interoperability standards such as HL7 FHIR, DICOM RESTful web service, and others to integrate within existing systems. It is also scalable.
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Chris Newmarker is senior editor of Qmed. Follow him on Twitter at @newmarker.
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[Image courtesy of Philips]